Is It Hatred?
by RemusSiriusJames
Summary: In times like this, it seems, I think about him. Times when I have nothing to distract me from the guilt that threatens to suck me in, as though I am in an ocean, and the waves refuse to let me come up for air.


**Author's Note:** I don't own these characters (I think this is the first disclaimer I have put before a fic, oye (I have a disclaimer on my profile, though)). I was feeling kind of bad about some stuff with my own brother (and about myself) for months, so I figured if I wrote, I'd be able to feel better... maybe.

It is quiet in here.

The quiet in the bedroom presses hard on my eardrums, though it is nothing compared to the feeling that is pulling at the center of my chest, as though an anvil was attached to my heart in an attempt to pull it down. The unease and pain travels into my stomach, making it nauseous; into my nerves which numb my arms and legs. As I sit in my room, which I have been doing a a lot lately, I feel the familiar loneliness which had never existed before, as though a void has been created which had never existed in my life before.

As I close my eyes, the pain in my body seems to double, triple, as my memories surface. Feelings of anger, immediately followed by strong guilt settle in my core, making the anvil sink lower. I clench my fists, almost wishing my nails would cut into the flesh of my palms to rid myself of this inner, emotional pain. This is all I will do. Never will I cause myself physical pain, as I have a great dislike to pain.

It is quiet in here.

In times like this, it seems, I think about him. Times when I have nothing to distract me from the guilt that threatens to suck me in, as though I am in an ocean, and the waves refuse to let me come up for air.

As a child, I looked up to him. He was my older brother and I loved him, unconditionally, as a brother should. He was older than me, so we weren't as close as most might think, even with our age difference. After he went away, and he grew, I also grew. I grew in a house with my parents, being swamped under their beliefs, under their protection, becoming a soft, weak person. A small sneer crosses my lips.

Those words he had uttered, years ago, to my mother, "You can protect your precious child; Regulus is weak, not strong at all-" had brought an unfamiliar feeling into my body. The feeling of my emotions crashing down around me as the man I once looked up to seemed to break me. The most intense pain I had ever felt -as though my heart would burst out of my ribs- surfaced and brought forth a feeling I had experienced only once in my lifetime, but never as strongly as I felt it then. The burning, fiery feeling that seemed to consume my heart and soul entered me then, and has stayed with me for years.

What is that feeling, I still wonder.

I used to call it hatred, because it had been the only feeling that I could relate to that feeling. For years, this newly found hatred burned in me like a wild fire. My brother and I did not speak for years. Even when he seemed to move on, I found I could not.

At last, I feel this feeling, this hatred, beginning to ebb away. Now I wonder, was it really hatred? I label it now as resentment, but was it really? No one believes me; no one believes my hatred for my brother. Now, years later, neither do I. Can I really hate my own blood? Can I hate the man who didn't seem to give a damn about me; the man who ignored me when I wanted to speak with him, when I longed so badly to make things right between us? I know I am not innocent in any of this; having acted on his words once had built the barrier between us.

I often wonder if Sirius was right. I am a weak person, someone who curls up into a corner to protect themselves from any outside pain, someone who can't defend themselves, and I often make a fool of myself if I try. Sirius's hurtful words and the silent treatment he gave me made me begin to even hate myself; blame myself for this treatment.

Though, slowly, Sirius and I are beginning to speak again, it is hard. When I think about him, look at his picture on my dresser, I can't mask the guilty feelings I still feel. It used to be so easy to answer the question "How do you feel about your brother," with a simple, "I hate him."

Was it really hated?

Are the guilty feelings I have from this experience from the hatred I felt for him, or had it been from something else.

I often wonder these things, when sitting alone in my room, as the anvil on my heart grows heavier.

It is quiet in here.

**Author's Note: **Was it really hatred?


End file.
